GOTHENBURG.- History Acts is an exhibition about our relationship to past and present. Eleven internationally active artists are taking part. Their works range from the manufacture of news items and imaginary insurance companies to water-powered computers in 1950’s Guatemela and accounts related by citizens of Göteborg concerning their places of work.

In one way or another history is always with us. It affects our behaviour today, regardless of whether it concerns transitional processes pervading society in general or the acts of some single individual. And our attitude to history changes as the years pass partly as the result of education, of media reporting, architecture and urban planning, parental upbringing or established traditions.

For these reasons it is important to try to understand and make sense of what has happened: when does an event become a part of history? How much time has first to have passed? Is it indeed possible for anyone to claim to record the truth? What can we learn from this? What does it mean to be a human being?

History Acts aims to serve as intermediary in conducting an overall examination of history, doing so by study of accounts based on documents, artefacts, and fiction. The exhibition does not attempt to treat history as a uniform concept but rather as a multitude of reports dealing with past time and examining how far it is possible – from the evidence they give – to predict anything about the future.

The exhibition’s aim is to present works of art all of which illustrate a kind of archaeological approach, an in-depth examination of a single site, event or the memories of a single individual. All the artworks on show have their roots in a social reality, even if that specific reality may very well be itself a fiction or construct.